Dying Daily #272: Fathers

We’ll get back to the specifics of following-through tomorrow or the day after.

There is really no way around the fact that we owe our lives to a father of some kind. Even if it’s just a literal sperm donor, somewhere, somehow, we all have fathers.

There is also no way around the fact that this is the full extent of gratitude that some people owe to their particular father figure. Half of their DNA, that’s it.

I am not one of those people. I am fortunate enough to have a great father who I am very close with. We have fought a lot over the years, and a vast majority of these fights have been my fault.

My father taught me how to work, to treat people with respect and that choices have consequences. He taught me that there such things as right and wrong and that we need to plan for the long term.

I didn’t always listen.

I rarely listened.

And this cost me over the years. I always wanted to listen, and I always intended to, but I just didn’t really know how to put it all into practice.

So maybe I listened, but I didn’t know how to make it work, and this is what cost me. It cost me time and money and blood and tears, but I was lucky enough to have had the seeds for good things planted so that they could eventually grow into something real.

I still learn things from my father and I am better about putting these things into actual practice. I know that a lot of people are less fortunate than me and do not have good fathers, and I think this is why men being willing to mentor young men is so important. The best men I know do this, and we need it.

What did your father teach you, either directly or indirectly?

Are there things you can learn from your father whether they are present or not?

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“My formula for greatness in a human being is amor fati: that one wants nothing to be different, not forward, not backward, not in all eternity. Not merely bear what is necessary, still less conceal it… but love it.” Nietzsche